Work in Progress

The uniform by itself is done but there's still plenty of details to paint ! (bags, weapons and so on). When working on hundreds of figures I have to find the good balance between speed and quality to get the best possible result in the shortest time. it's clearly not realistic to compete for the best figure ever paint with thousands to do but all the details must be visible at some distance with naked eyes and without extra lights, otherwise it could be a waste of time to paint them, and the black underlining help a lot. It explain my way of painting like this.

I've added a white line around the cuffs (by brush), and a red line on the queue of the coat (V shape) by a red ink pen (Pilot Frixion point 0,3mm). 0,3 is still big (compared to a 5/0 brush) but it was the smallest tip available, I've discovered a range of pen able to be used, from 0,3mm to 0,7mm (Mitsubichi pens with valuable metals colors, it's acrylic paints !!! I've painted the drums with it). Sometime the brush is better and sometime it's the pen who give the best and fastest job.

Some officers have a Voltigeur collar and some others a Grenadiers/Fusiliers collar, while some collars are left with the blue uniform, everything is accurate.

The chevrons of the drummers are yellow (Vallejo 70953)The metal color of the drum is the mitsubishi pen UM 153 bronze (Pigment ink), the rope is Vallejo 70984 flat brown with a white part, the blue around the drum is Vallejo 70809 Royal Blue and black underlining is an ink pen (G-TEC-C - 0,4mm Pilot).

Drum sticks are Vallejo 70984 flat brown with a laiton part (Vallejo 70801). Every updates take months but it's the price to pay for this huge project. I've also improved my way of cutting and enlarging photos to better see the smallest details.

They look very nice, very detailed job. It seems you had a very good parade! some vehicles were quite unusual and rare to see.

I am most intrigued by your use of ink pens to paint fine details, so they are water resistant? you have to paint white first, or you can apply it over any colour? do they rub off with wear or they last like normal acrylic paint?

Thanks a lot for all photos and videos - they are really very useful for us. I would appreciate only to put the material in a own new topic that they are more obvious for the forum-participants. Some won´t find them because they are positioned in your topic Russia 1812.

Thank you my friends !Susofrick, if you're afraid of the ink pen quality you can cover the result with Vallejo mat varnish, it's easy and fast and this is what I've done on the backpack in this step but the reason was only to secure the use of a pencil. the ink pens are as great and secure as Vallejo colors !

This step is all about painting equipment of the soldier, there's 3 kind of water bottle and 3 different painting :

The blade of the sword (officers) is Citadel Color 61-55 Mithril silver

The cartridge pouch on the back is black, with a gold insigna (Vallejo 70801 laiton) for Voltigeurs and another different one for Grenadiers of the same color, fusiliers don't have any insigna.

The backpack is Vallejo 70940 Saddle brown, with some touch of Vallejo 70876 brown sand, the whole is covered by a black wash. Straps of this bag are white, surrounded with a black line made by a pencil

Above the bakpack is a rolled greatcoat painted in Vallejo 70989 grey + black wash, drybrush and white straps, like the step above.

And below the backpack is the bayonet and saber, in Black with gold tip (The saber only : Vallejo 70801 laiton) and white strap

Thanks for the tip on outlining the vests and straps with a fine tip "ink" pen. I bought a 005 Prismacolor premier black ink pen at my local craft hobby store and really like the results. I'm working of these same Hat figures myself and am at about the same stage of painting as you are (although my results are not as good as yours). Can't wait to start using this on Austrians as well! Gives me a good reason to update my own floundering WIP thread.

After many test I've tried one more different method to paint the faces and it will be this method for all the figures of this big project because the result give me satisfaction. Of course you can paint them in a different way and get a great result too, there's not only one answer to this problem.

a touch of white Vallejo for the eyes, the black dot and the mouth is made by a Rotring pencil (0.35) It's so easy and fast like this, when you consider how difficult it is to obtain a perfect black dot with a brush... a real nightmare and time consuming.

I've added a black wash only on the Beige, and a drybrush only for the others colors, completed with a touch of mat varnish on the pencil work, it's not really necessary, but like this the result won't move for sure, it's fixed for ever !!!